


and should I then presume? and how should I begin?

by lovebeyondmeasure



Category: Cormoran Strike Series - Robert Galbraith
Genre: Eventual... something, F/M, Minor Original Character(s), Post-Career of Evil
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-06
Updated: 2018-03-06
Packaged: 2019-03-14 13:31:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13591086
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovebeyondmeasure/pseuds/lovebeyondmeasure
Summary: Cormoran and Robin: seeking, searching, finding, scathing, tired, together, drinking, touching, parting, seeking, finding.or,There's a party, and a man, and a drink, and a kiss, and a cab. Not quite in that order.





	1. there will be time to prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet

**Author's Note:**

> The prompt was "Shut up and kiss me." Lord only know what it's turned into.
> 
> Title and chapter titles from t.s. eliot's "the love song of j. alfred prufrock"

“He’s coming over here!” Robin hissed. “This was your plan, what is wrong with you?”

“I’ve had a better idea-” Cormoran wasn’t sure what had come over him, but he was unsettled, jumpy.

“You should’ve done that sooner. Here he is, shut up and kiss me!”

And suddenly he had his arms full of Robin, who was pressing her mouth firmly to his, and it was… extremely awkward. 

A voice behind her cleared its throat. She pulled away from him, and her eyes were stormy. Her face cleared as she turned around to face the voice, which belonged to a short man with thinning reddish hair and a sour expression.

“Miss Chilcott,” the man said frostily. “So this is where you’ve gone off to.”

“Hello, Mr. Andrews,” Robin said, coolly cheerful. “Have you met my date?”

“Don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure,” Mr. Andrews said, giving Cormoran an unfriendly look-over. He reflexively drew himself up a bit straighter and sucked in his stomach a bit. 

“Darling, this is Mr. Andrews. Mr. Andrews, my date, Damien Phillips.”

Cormoran extended a hand, which Mr. Andrews shook with ill grace. His hand was small but his handshake tight and firm. Cormoran disliked him immensely and now understood why Robin had been so irritated.

“Mr. Phillips,” the shorter man said. “What do you do for a living?”

Cormoran could read the tension in the body language; clearly this Mr. Andrews had done something to Robin, to make her so tense. And the way he was looking at her, possessively, made Cormoran want to- well. He couldn’t make a scene now. He settled for sliding an arm around Robin’s waist and drawing her close.

“I work the market for private clients,” he said casually. Mr. Andrews was unable to fully hide his contempt. Cormoran really disliked the man now.

“And how is that going for you?”

“Well, it has its ups and downs, but these days I find myself up more than otherwise,” he said, stroking his fingers along the fabric of Robin’s dress to remind her to relax. She took a slightly shuddery breath, then another.

“Mr. Andrews here works for Marchester and Sons,” she said, and suddenly Cormoran understood- she thought this man might be the leak their client was seeking. “He was telling me how he knows everyone who’s anyone.”

“I do,” the man said, slightly contemptuously. “But I’ve never even heard of you, Mr. Phillips.”

“That’s quite alright,” Cormoran said. “I prefer to keep my name out of things.”

“Mmm,” Mr. Andrews said, one eyebrow carefully raised. “Well, I’ll leave you to it, then.” He nodded at Cormoran, and eyed Robin. “Do let me know if there’s anything I can do for you, Miss Chilcott. Anything at all.”

“I will,” Robin replied, brittle but polite. Mr. Andrews drifted off, glancing back over his shoulder at the pair before blending into the crowd.

Robin heaved a sigh and leaned into Cormoran. Without thinking, he tightened his grip around her waist.

“He is thoroughly nasty,” she said quietly. “I saw him sneaking a picture up a woman’s skirt. I didn’t think that happened after school.”

“You think he’s the leak?” Cormoran asked. Robin had made no move to pull away from him, and he felt frozen, unwilling to disturb this fragile moment.

“I’m nearly positive. He was bragging to me and this other girl about how he has loads of connections, could set us up with a better job at any of three other companies. And he hadn’t asked what either of us did, so he was very certain of it.” She sighed. “Plus, I saw him talking to the CFO of Parking Brothers, and the head of DCL. So he’s been making the rounds, so to speak.”

“Good catch,” Cormoran said. He’d been keeping tabs on the room, but hadn’t spotted nearly as much as Robin had from the bar. “Did you get his information?”

“Other than his last name and place of employment?” Robin pulled away from him at last. “Of course I did.” And from her clutch she produced a business card: heavy, cream-colored, and embossed.

“Good work tonight,” he said, and he knew he sounded a bit warmer, a bit more pleased, than he probably should. _Time to get some space, Strike._ “I’ll grab you a drink, yeah? You take a break.”

“Would you? Another white wine, I think,” she said. “Thanks, Cormoran.”

“Yeah,” he said, and went off to find the bar. Among the anonymous faces at this industry event, he felt both more and less like himself.

The bar was swarmed with the young and the loud. Cormoran fought his way up and waited patiently for the harried tender to make his way over.

Someone tapped heavily on his arm. “Scuse me, sorry,” a pretty girl in a pink-gold dress said tipsily. “But are you Lizzie Chilcott’s date? Whatsyername, ah. Damien?”

“Yes,” Cormoran said, surprised. “I am. And you are?”

“See! I told you!” the girl was saying to her friend. “I’m Wendy, Wendy Livingstone, and Lizzie described you to a T!”

“Oh,” he said. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“She said you looked like a boxer who’d gone one too many rounds,” Wendy was going on, “and that your hair was a mess of curls, and that you had,” and now she leaned in, “a _presence about you_.” She hiccuped a laugh, and her eyes were dancing. Cormoran had no idea how to react to this information.

“Did she?” he managed.

“Yeah, when that bloke Andrews came round sniffing our skirts,” she replied, tossing her hair. “Creepy git. She said her date could tie him in a knot. And I bet you could, couldn’t you.” This was less flirtatious and more vicious than he was expecting. 

“I met him,” he said. “Didn’t seem likeable.”

“He’s not!” Wendy exclaimed. She threw back the last of her drink. “He’s awful, he treats us girls like we’re, like, things, y’know?” She huffed and looked at her empty glass. “Paulie! I need another!”

The bartender came over to take her glass. Cormoran leaned in while the man was there. “And can I have a scotch, neat, and a small glass of white wine?”

Wendy leaned into his arm. “Getting Lizzie another? Tell her-” she took a deep breath- “tell her g’bye if I don’t see her, will’ye? I think this oughta be my last one.”

“Not a bad idea,” Cormoran said. “Nice meeting you, Wendy.”

“You too!” She raised her full glass to his nod.

Cormoran took his drinks, tipped the bartender, and wended his way back to where Robin was waiting for him. For a moment, he just looked at her, seeing the tightness around her eyes, the tension in her shoulders. Her lipstick was smudged. _That was you,_ a voice in his head supplied. _She kissed you. Remember?_

Right. She had. It had been awful and... strange. He shook his head and went over.

“Oh, bless,” Robin said, taking her wine and immediately drinking a decent portion of it. Cormoran took a sip of his scotch and didn’t comment.

“I met your friend Wendy,” he said. 

“Oh, did you?” she said, laughing a little. “When she saw me, she greeted me by name and was convinced we’d gone to primary school together. I just let her think that. Easiest cover in the world.”

Cormoran smiled into his drink. “She said to say bye, she was leaving soon.”

“Oh, I’m jealous,” Robin said. 

“Why, do you want to go?”

“I’m just tired of men putting their hands on my arse,” Robin said crossly, before taking another drink. “What is it about finance men and groping?”

Cormoran carefully relaxed his grip on his glass. “Who was it?”

She gave him an odd look. “I don’t know, they’re mostly good at being anonymous about it. Does it matter?”

_It does to me._ “I don’t like men who put their hands on women without invitation,” Cormoran said instead.

“Well, that’s most of them, at least here,” she said. 

“We found the leak, right?” Cormoran said, forcing his mind away from the anger that bubbled up at the thought of the rich, entitled men who’d been groping at Robin. He hadn’t noticed, hadn’t even thought of it, and he was the reason she was here. “Andrews is the leak. Our job is done.”

“We don’t have proof, though,” Robin objected. 

“We can get proof later. We have his card. C’mon, let’s go. I’m tired of this,” Cormoran said. To punctuate this, he threw back his scotch. (Pity, it was rather good.)

“Alright,” Robin said, and the relief she was unable to hide convinced him he’d made the right choice. She, too, finished the last of her drink, and took his proffered arm. Her grip was firm and tight.

They slipped out without much notice, and took one of the cabs that was loitering outside the venue, waiting for the partygoers to exit. In the backseat, Robin leaned against the door, away from him, and Cormoran took the hint, sliding across to sit behind the driver. 

He gave the man the office address, but Robin stopped him. 

“I’d like to go home, please,” she said, and Cormoran could have kicked himself. Why would she come back to the office now? It was late, and they were both tired.

The drive was quiet, Cormoran tense and Robin staring sightless out the window. The driver played Arabic music and hummed along.

When they pulled up the curb at her building, she tapped his arm gently.

“Would you like to come up?” she asked. Cormoran couldn’t stop the look of surprise. She looked slightly embarrassed, but said, “I know you’re tired, and it’s a ways back to the office. My flatmate’s out of town if you’d like to stay over, and I could make us breakfast?”

This was not was he was expecting, and it wasn’t the sort of thing they usually did. He caught the driver’s eye in the mirror. 

Robin took a deep breath, then confessed in a rush, “With Stacia gone, it's just me, and it's, I don't...”

He put several pieces together, all at once. “Yeah, sure. Thanks,” he said, and rummaged for his wallet to pay the driver.

Robin slipped out ahead of him, and he followed her quietly into the building and to the elevator. He wasn’t going to make any comment; he understood, on an implicit level, why she had asked. 

“So what’s on the menu for breakfast?”

Robin’s laugh was startled out of her, and it was a sweet sound. “I have eggs, or I can make pancakes,” she said, and her voice was relieved. “Stacia won’t mind if you borrow her bed for the night, but if you’d prefer not to, our couch is quite big and comfy.”

“Eggs sounds good,” he said. “We’ll see about the rest.”


	2. roll it toward some overwhelming question

Robin led them down the short hall to her door, and as she fumbled her key from the tiny pocket in her clutch, Cormoran took stock of the situation.

He had never been to Robin’s flat before. It simply hadn’t occurred to him as something that might happen; it wasn’t how they conducted themselves. But under these circumstances, he couldn’t have done otherwise, couldn’t have left Robin, not when she looked so… vulnerable, there in the back of the cab. This might have been a mistake, he acknowledged to himself, but he would see it through.

Unlocking the door, Robin beckoned him in. He went in, taking in the space.

It was an ordinary flat, white walls and scuffed wooden floors, but he could nearly taste Robin’s personality in it. Some of it had to be her flatmate’s, of course, but he could see Robin in the framed posters on the walls, in the colorful blanket draped over the couch, in the potted plants by the window. She had made this her home.

“Take your coat?” she offered, hanging hers on standing rack. He shrugged his off as well and handed it to her. She seemed nervous, moving from the rack, kicking off her heels, going into the kitchen. The tiny galley kitchen had a window and a breakfast bar, and he could see her rummaging around in the cabinets, setting the kettle to boil.

“Tea?” she asked. “I’ve got some of that stuff from Masham you liked.”

“Yes, please,” he replied, still standing, still looking.

“You can sit, if you like,” she said. “Anywhere’s fine.”

“Oh,” he said. “Yeah, thanks.”

He settled, after careful consideration, into a stately wingback chair which had an old-fashioned floral pattern and a matching footstool. Settling his leg up, he heaved a sigh of relief. 

“Big mug, small mug?” Robin asked from behind him.

“Big,” he called back. 

“Alright.”

He thought, for a brief moment, about taking off his prosthesis. Robin had seen him without it before, and they were in the privacy of her flat, unlikely to be disturbed. But he discarded this; it felt too intimate, considering.

“Here you are, then,” Robin said a few minutes later. Cormoran opened his eyes to see Robin setting a large, green mug on the table beside him. “Just how you like it.”

“Thanks, Robin,” he said, watching with eye half-closed as she carefully settled herself, still in her smart blue dress, onto the couch. It was, as she’d said, large and comfortable-looking. She curled into the arm and blew on her tea.

Cormoran felt oddly peaceful. It was relatively quiet, here, compared to his flat, and the distant sounds of traffic were a lullaby to him by now. Robin hadn’t turned on any overhead lights, just a lamp, and the room was bathed in a gentle golden glow that made it seem very warm and cozy. The tea smelled right, the chair was comfortable, and Robin was… Robin.

She was quietly sipping her tea, making no demands of him, requiring no conversation. He felt, suddenly, as though they should be speaking.

“So how did you find this Andrews?” he asked as he picked up his tea. The mug was, indeed, quite large, and fit comfortably in his hands.

Robin perked up. He knew that she liked to tell him about her thought processes and findings; it was very clear that she sought validation for her work. He had no qualms to give it to her, though, as she was developing into a rather good investigator, with good instincts and the mind to follow them up. With enough encouragement, she would be very good at this job one day.

“Well,” she began, “I told you how I met Wendy at the bar, so I let her introduce me around and tell me all the latest gossip. I was rather glad I’d done all the research this afternoon!” She laughed a little. “I was able to say, oh, Richard, is he still at Parking? And I looked like I actually knew people.”

“Good work on that,” he said, and watched the way her smile tucked into the corner of her mouth. 

“Thanks,” she said. “So Wendy was going on about this and that, and then we saw this other bloke, I think his name was Leonard or something like that, Leopold maybe? And she told me to steer clear of him, he’s ‘as bad as Andrews,’ so I asked her had he gotten worse.” She took a sip of tea and looked proud of herself. 

“And she thought you already knew how bad he was, but of course she’d go into it. Brilliant, Robin.”

She blushed and tucked her hair back. “Yeah, she went right into it, and there was just something about her stories that made me think something was off. Like, she said he came for all these meetings and things, but he’s not actually connected to the issues. She thought it was weird, but when I asked which meetings he’d been at, she listed off a few and they matched with the leaks. So when she spotted him, I just flashed some extra leg and he came right over.”

Cormoran felt an odd tightness in his chest at this. “Robin, you know you don’t have to-”

She cut him off, flicking her hair dismissively. “I know, but it was the easiest way to get him over without making some sort of scene. Anyway, once he came to chat us up and started name-dropping and all, I steered the conversation towards the companies who’ve been stealing tips and clients, and wouldn’t you know he went right on about all the people he knows over there and how he could put in any number of good words for me.” She rolled her eyes expressively. “So that’s when I became sure of it. Wendy kept telling him to shove off, but I took his card, just in case. So that’s that.”

He nodded, still caught up slightly at how casual Robin had been about using her legs to draw Andrews in. 

She sighed, unfurling a little. “I’m done in, and you must be dying to get out of that suit. I’m quite done with this dress, myself. It was cute in the shop but after five hours, I’m feeling less charitable.”

“It looks good on you, though,” he said without thinking. She blinked at him.

“Oh. Thank you,” she said, after a pause. “Well, I’ll go dig up something for you to wear, Stacia’s boyfriend leaves his clothes here all the time. I think he uses our building’s laundry machines.”

Cormoran had been wondering about what he’d wear, and now only hoped the boyfriend wasn’t too much smaller. “Thanks. Ah, where’s…”

Robin stood and stretched, lean in the low light. “Ah, right. Bedrooms are down past the kitchen, and if you go down this short hall here, there’s a loo and Stacia’s studio. You’ll want the left-hand door.”

She went off back towards the bedrooms, and Strike went to relieve himself.

Staring at his face in the mirror, he thought about Wendy telling him how she recognized him. _A boxer who’d gone one too many rounds_ echoed a thought he’d had a time or two himself, and his hair was undeniably and regrettably curly, but _a presence_ was new. Different. What sort of presence? From context, this was a positive thing. Wasn’t it? He splashed some cold water on his face and decided it was time to move on.

He waited in the main room of the flat, which seemed to be sitting room and dining room in one. After a few minutes, Robin re-emerged, looking far more relaxed. She had braided her hair back loosely, and was wearing a worn-looking shirt and loose flannel sleep trousers. 

She held out a pile of folded clothing to him, looking oddly shy. “Here, Ashraf’s stuff should fit you OK. Um, I’ve texted Stacia, she said it’s fine for you to use her room tonight.” 

He took the clothing from her and didn’t quite know where to look. “That’s kind of her.”

“Well,” Robin half-smiled. “I’ve been very good about her having Ashraf ‘round at all hours, and clearing out when she asks. I’ll put some of my clean sheets on her bed for you.”

The depths of her thoughtfulness always caught him off-guard. “Thank you, Robin.”

“I should be thanking you,” she said, rubbing her arm. He knew, without thinking, that she was touching the fading scar that ran along it. 

“It’s not a big deal, really,” he said. “You’d do the same for me, if I asked.” She looked at at him, nodded. “You’d do the same for anyone, I think.”

She laughed, and he was pleased. “Maybe not anyone, but certainly for you, not that you’d ever ask for anything,” she said, and he thought she was teasing. 

“I ask you for things all the time,” he objected, striving for that same light tone.

“Not like this, though,” she said, softly. “Thank you, Cormoran.”

It seemed odd to hear his given name. Nearly everyone in his life called him something else. He was accustomed to answering to many things. But Robin always called him by his name. Well, except when she called him “Mr. Strike” in front of clients. He wondered how she knew what that meant to him. 

“You’re welcome,” he said. She ducked her head, toying with the end of her braid.

“I’ll just go take care of the sheets,” she said. “You can change in my room, if the loo isn’t big enough for you.”

She turned away, and he thoughtlessly watched her go, reading the back of her shirt: “MASHAM” it read in large, worn letters at the top, then lower down, “Rugby for Relief 2009.” He realized it was some sort of old giveaway from a fundraising event. 

As she disappeared into a bedroom, it struck him that Matthew had played rugby. Had, in fact, been very proud of playing rugby. Was it… was she wearing an old shirt of Matthew’s? Now? Still?

He took the clothing back to the bathroom, thinking about this. It didn’t make sense for her to hang on to anything belonging to Him. On the other hand, it was an old shirt, and maybe she’d had it so long she now thought of it as hers? It was clearly oversized and seemed to be a player’s shirt, though, and he couldn’t see Robin holding on to anything of His at this point. 

He shook his head briskly. There was no point dwelling on this, he told himself. It was just a shirt, and none of his business, besides.

He finished shedding the layers of his suit, dropping them carelessly on the floor. He’d deal with them later. After some careful tugging, he found Ashraf’s clothing fit alright, though the tee was a bit snug. The basketball shorts were fine, though, and had the added bonus of making his prosthesis easy to remove later.

Back in the main room, he draped the pieces of his suit over the back of one of the chairs, and went to see which of the rooms he’d be inhabiting. 

On the right, Robin was throwing a blanket over the top of a double bed. “Oh, there you are,” she said, hearing his heavy footsteps. “You’ll be in here.”

“Thanks,” he said once more, taking in Stacia’s room. It was clear, not too cluttered, with postcards taped to the walls and colorful clothing spilling out of the closet. 

“Let me know if you need anything else,” Robin was saying quickly, stepping out of his way as he came in. She moved towards the door. “I can get you a towel if you’d like, but I wouldn’t think you’d want to take a shower here.”

Cormoran thought of the graceful claw-footed tub he’d seen, and shook his head. “No, I’ll be alright.”

She nodded. “OK. I think I’m going to go shower and turn in, then. Oh, did you need a mobile charger?”

He realized he’d left his mobile in his trouser pocket. “Yes, thanks for reminding me,” he said. “I’ll go get that.”

“I’ll get you a cable, Stacia’s got a different type than you have,” Robin said, and slipped away. 

Getting his mobile out, he saw that he’d managed to miss a call from his sister. He tapped out a text asking if everything was alright, then went back to the bedroom. Robin held out a cable.

“Charger’s plugged in behind the headboard. Let me know if you need anything else,” she said, glancing down the hall before looking back at him.

“I should be fine, but thank you, Robin,” he said. 

“Thank you,” she replied, and once more ducked away. 

Cormoran went into Stacia’s room and shut the door. Once his mobile was charging, he finally, blessedly, unhooked his prosthesis from his leg, setting it aside and massaging the sore scar tissue there. He wondered if there would be any cornstarch to be had in the morning as he laid himself out carefully.

The mattress was softer than he preferred, and Stacia seemed to have a thing for pillows, as there were about five. The light from the window cast odd shadows on the walls. He could hear Robin moving around, then the distant sound of the shower starting.

His life had well-prepared him for sleeping in unfamiliar places, and he began the deep breathing that would send him off in no time. Cormoran was awake only long enough to notice how the pillowcase smelled faintly of Robin’s detergent before the darkness came up and took him away in soft arms.


	3. after the cups, the marmalade, the tea,

Cormoran awoke tangled in sheets, mouth dry and chest heaving, fading impressions of explosions blazing across the back of his eyelids.

As soon as it percolated through his brain that he was conscious, that is to say in charge of his own motor function, he began taking deep, even breaths, clenching and unclenching his hands slowly. The shadows on the wall, wavering gold and grey, told him it was still dark out; couldn’t be past 4 a.m., and probably earlier than that. He’d most likely only been asleep for a few hours.

Slowly, he sat up in bed, his neglected abdominal muscles complaining. There, in the doorway, was Robin.

He was so startled he nearly fell flat on his back once more; propped on his elbows, he croaked out, “Robin?”

“Sorry,” came her voice, a whisper in the half-dark. “I couldn’t sleep, and you were....”

He felt something in his chest clench. “I was shouting,” he finished for her. “Wasn’t I.”

“Yeah,” she said, so quiet. “But I know better than to try and wake someone who’s… dreaming. Like that. So I just came to make sure you didn’t get hurt.”

The old shame he carried seemed to twist about at this. But of course she understood, in her own way. She most likely had dreams of her own. She wouldn’t try to shake him awake and cry when he lashed out in his sleep, not like Charlotte. ( _But was anything Robin did like Charlotte?_ some other part of his brain asked.)

Just stand there, and watch, to make sure he didn’t hurt himself. And he had, in the past; fallen off the bed, lashed out at the wall. Once he’d swung a fist and smashed a lamp off the bedside table. Charlotte hadn’t spoken to him for three days.

“I’m sorry,” he said, realizing he’d been sitting there silently. He could feel a hot wave of embarrassment threatening; he’d stayed here to make Robin feel safe, and instead he’d kept her awake and probably scared her in the bargain.

“No,” she said, and he saw she was draped in some sort of oversized shawl that she’d tucked around her slim form. “No, don’t apologize. I know. It’s fine.”

His elbows were complaining. Cormoran heaved himself fully upright, sliding back to lean against the wall. He didn’t know what to say to her, in this odd hour. He could taste the remainder of his nightmare like gunpowder ash and blood in his mouth. 

Leaning against the door frame, he could see Robin’s bare feet, the shadow her eyelashes cast across her cheek. She looked washed out, tired. The circles under her eyes looked deeper than he’d ever seen, except maybe for just After.

“I’m sorry anyway,” he said. “I don’t want to keep you awake. You look as tired as I feel.”

The moment he said it, he thought it had been the wrong thing; women didn’t like being told they looked tired, generally speaking. But Robin only choked a laugh and scuffed her toes across the floorboards.

“I wasn’t sleeping,” she said. “It’s quite alright.”

“Oh,” he said. He looked at her for a moment more. “Are you going to go sleep now?”

She gave a sort of half-shrug. “I might go lie down and close my eyes,” she said. “Don’t know that it would work.”

“I usually have a drink, at that point,” Cormoran said. It occurred to him that this might be oversharing, which he had scrupulously avoided for a very long time, with Robin especially. But there was something about this moment, knowing that Robin must have seen him shouting in his sleep and had done nothing but kept watch over him. Knowing that she, in a real way, understood.

“Sometimes a drink helps,” she agreed, still so quiet. “But not tonight, I think.”

“No,” he agreed. “Not tonight.”

He saw the way she’d tucked her arms in close, hugging herself, saw that she wasn’t looking directly at him.

“If you’re not going back to sleep,” he said, slowly, “would you like to come in?”

They were already here, he thought. And there was something about late nights, shadowy rooms, that lent itself to an air of secrecy; in these small hours, it was as if time ran slow. As if nothing was quite real, as if in the morning you could decide it never happened.

And, he knew, he felt guilty, for having kept her awake, for possibly having scared her.

But he could read her hesitation, and cursed himself. This was a bridge too far, and he’d said the wrong thing, and now she would be upset, or uncomfortable.

“I was thinking of making some tea to help me sleep,” she said instead. “If you’d like a cup?”

“Oh,” he said. “Yeah. Cup of tea sounds nice.”

And, somehow… it actually did.

“I’ll go put on the kettle, then,” Robin said. “I can bring it to you here, if you’d like.”

“What?”

He saw the way her eyes cut to his prosthesis and- of course, he didn’t have his crutch here. He’d have to strap the damn thing back on if he wanted to go out to the main room.

“No,” he said impulsively. “I’ll come out.”

“Alright,” she said, and disappeared, silent in her bare feet.

Already regretting his decision, he tugged the prosthesis over, and began the process of putting it on. His leg was swollen and sore from standing at that party for so long, and it wasn’t a good fit. He swore under his breath, wondering if he could just wear it long enough to get out to a chair. 

Robin reappeared in the doorway as he was about to give up.

“I have a few options for- oh, is your leg giving you trouble?”

She said this so easily, without stumbling or hesitating, and it made his heart clench. Charlotte had always referred to his prosthesis with a curled lip, had tried to joke about it; Robin simply called it “his leg,” as though everyone’s legs came off. 

When he looked up at her, he knew his frustration was plain on his face. She looked at him for a moment, then was gone.

A beat later, and he understood; she came back pushing a wheeled office desk chair. “I know it’s not great,” she began, now stumbling, now hesitating. 

“Robin,” he said. “It’s fine. It’s perfect. Bring it here.”

And all the embarrassment of getting into the chair around its arms, of being essentially pushed along out into the main room, it was eclipsed by the way she’d seen that he wanted to come out of the bedroom, and couldn’t, and had simply solved the problem. No fuss, no jokes, no awkwardness, not really. Just facts: here was how it would work, and here was how they did it.

Robin left him at the breakfast bar to take the kettle off the stove, and Cormoran used his arm strength to get onto one of the stools, facing into the kitchen. He watched the way that Robin moved with sureness, here in her own space. She had turned on a lamp off in the dining area, and it cast the space in a sort of warm sideways glow.

She brought out two more mugs, and again his was large, setting them next to the lemon and the sugar.

“I have two sorts of bedtime tea,” she said, pushing two boxes towards him. “I prefer the camomile and honey, usually, it’s quite sweet. The Pukka is also good, though.”

He smelled each tea bag, weighing his options. “A sleepy crush of oat flower, soothing lavender, and silky-sweet limeflower together with the magic of valerian,” he read from the Pukka box, his tone slightly wondering, slightly derisive. He saw Robin rolling her eyes a little at him, fondly.

“I’ll have what you’re having,” he said finally. She gave him a slanted half-smile in the golden light, the sort of look that spoke of solidarity. He could hear the distant sound of honking, knew that there were many people even just in this building, but somehow, with the steaming kettle and tea brewing on the counter-top, it was as though he and Robin were in a tiny island of stillness, all alone.

“It needs to steep for five minutes,” she said, swirling a spoon through one mug, then the other.

He didn’t say anything, watching the fragrant steam drift up from the mugs in front of him. Robin, on the other side of the counter, leaned her elbows against the formica. 

Cormoran forced himself to not dwell on the silhouette of the rugby player on Robin’s shirt, instead looking around her tiny kitchen, barely more than a kitchenette. The tea towels caught his eye, cheerful yellow flowers behind a little bee, its flight path spelling out “Bee Kind.” It was, he thought, a very Robin-ish thing to have.

She took a deep breath, then released it. He looked over at her. It felt as if she’d been about to say something, but had decided not to.

“Everything OK, Robin?” he asked, as gently as he knew how.

She gave him a tiny smile, barely an upturn of the corners of her lips. “Yeah,” she said, looking back down at her tea. “Yeah, I’m all right.”

“Good,” he replied. The silence curled round them, soft and heavy, warm as a blanket. Cormoran let it settle, allowing himself to relax into it. Robin lifted the tea bags from their mugs. He watched the way she let them drip back down, rippling the surface of their drinks. 

The clock on the microwave read 2:53. Robin lifted her mug to him, a silent toast. He took his own, tapping it ever-so-gently against hers, and they each took a sip.

“It’s good,” he said, almost surprised. 

“Yes,” she said, concealing a smile behind her cup. “I think so too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More plot to come next chapter. I'm not asking for a vote, just opinions- do you feel like, in this story, they're heading for a big romance, some sort of confession and kiss? (You know, my usual sort of thing.) Or for something else? I'm wondering too, let me know what you think.


	4. To have bitten off the matter with a smile,

As they sipped their tea, Cormoran noticed a bundle of yarn with metal rods poking out and- _ah,_ he realized, _it’s a piece of knitting in progress._

“Does your roommate knit?” he asked.

“Oh,” Robin said, leaning to look at the counter. He thought she might have blushed. “No, actually. Those are mine.”

“I didn’t know you…” Cormoran didn’t know how to finish the sentence. _Knit? Had a hobby? Enjoyed a life outside of this work we share?_

“No, I mostly don’t talk about it much,” she said, eyes on her mug. “It’s not a very ‘cool’ hobby to have.” Her tone spoke of previous experience in the matter, a sort of buried hurt that was no less easy to bear for it being small.

Cormoran reached for the nearest conversational thread, hoping to lighten her mood. “How’d you get into it?”

“My gran taught my mum, then when I was young she decided she ought to teach me,” Robin said, and there it was, the brightness in her eyes, the lift of her shoulders. Cormoran, listening as she went on about how she had resisted her gran at first then slowly gave in to the learning of it, thought that it really didn’t take much encouragement to bring Robin out of her shell. All it took was a bit of genuine interest.

“Anyway, seeing as how I’m the only girl in my generation, gran was dead pleased she managed to get the needles in my hands,” Robin said, drinking the last of her tea. “She left me a whole collection of supplies and things when she passed, since I was the only one who’d appreciate them. Good needles, and some really fine skeins, too. I’ve got a few saved away for when I’m ready for a real project.”

Cormoran, having finished his tea, found his empty hands reaching for the bundle. Afraid to touch the knit itself, he picked up the wound ball of deep maroon yarn, turning it round, enjoying its texture.

“What’s this going to be?” he asked, as Robin gently reached across the bar to take the yarn, and the half-finished project. 

“A cap,” she said. “For myself, probably. It’s a new pattern, and it’s fairly simple but I usually do one or two before I’ve got a pattern down well enough for gifts.”

She held up the already-knit work, and he saw it was on a sort of circular set of needles, as if the tips of regular knitting needles had been chopped off and attached at the cut ends with a bendy curve of plastic. The work was neat and looked complicated, and Cormoran’s tired eyes couldn’t quite follow it.

“It looks very pretty,” he said, for want of a better compliment. 

“Oh, it’s a bit of a mess, but I’ll get it eventually,” she said, tucking the bundle back together. “If I have the yarn left over, I might make a set of gloves to match.”

“That sounds nice,” Cormoran said. “Gloves are hard to find in the right size.”

“Are they?” Robin asked, surprised, then glanced down at his hands, laying empty on the counter. “Well, perhaps for you.”

“What was it Guy Somé called them, that time? My big, hairy mitts?” Cormoran said, recalling their time in the designer’s office, and the leather gloves which had not fit. 

Robin smiled at this, at him, at the memory of their first case together. “Well, perhaps I’ll see about making you something,” she said. “I could do a pair of mittens or fingerless gloves quite quickly.”

“Really?” Cormoran asked, touched. “You don’t have to do that.”

“Oh, fingerless gloves don’t take much time,” she said, studying his hands. The clock on the microwave now read 3:16. Robin reached out, gently lifting his hand, and he let her, watching the way she noted the size of it. She pressed their palms together, and he once more felt how small she was compared to him; not that Robin was petite, but her hands didn’t match his, not by a long shot.

She nodded, laying his hand palm-down on the counter-top and tracing one finger around it. “I have some dark grey left over from my da’s last birthday present, it’d suit you. I’ll see what I can do.”

Cormoran wondered, as he watched her hand absently play with his, if she would have made this offer in the daylight hours. If he’d discovered this hobby of hers in the office, would she had opened up like this? Would she have casually begun touching his hand? 

Certainly not. This was a product of this late night, their odd shared bond, the way he’d woken up, panting and vulnerable. Robin was, in many ways, a creature of night-time and soft shadows, he thought, though you wouldn’t know it to look at her. He felt that this was one of the things they had in common, that made them suited to be partners.

He realized, then, that Robin was still standing, had been standing this whole time. The stool he was sitting on was fine but perhaps not built with a person of his size in mind. He didn’t know how to suggest moving back to the couches, and knew that really they should be seeking their separate beds. In the morning, they’d be back on the case, dealing with the odious Mr. Andrews, their other cases, back to their sunlight selves.

There was a part of him, a small, selfish part, that wanted to cling to this moment. To continue to enjoy this quiet, hidden Robin, who seemed to have come out in the night-time, and who he rather liked. The Robin who spoke unhesitatingly of her Yorkshire childhood, who poured cups of tea with careful focus, who traced his hand gently on the countertop.

Robin yawned, then, behind one hand. The lack of sparkle on her fourth finger always caught him off-guard, even now, over a year past the last day she’d ever worn that sapphire.

“I think the tea is doing its job,” she said, with a slight smile, and he knew this moment was coming to a close. He mourned it, even as it happened. He knew, though, that he should let it pass, and go back to their safe distance, so carefully built and maintained. 

“Yeah,” he replied. “We ought to get some sleep while we can.”

She smiled, and yawned again. “Shall I wheel you back?”

In another mouth, those words would have been demeaning, rude, hurtful. When Robin said them, though, they were only an offer. She would, if he wished, leave him to make his own way in the chair, not out of disrespect or carelessness but in fact their inverse. 

“Thank you,” he said, and he knew that they would never speak of her pushing him around her flat in her desk chair again, unless he brought it up first. That was part of why he’d allowed it to happen at all. He didn’t think he’d ever have agreed to Charlotte doing anything like this.

Robin turned away to clean up their tea mugs, allowing Cormoran the dignity of manouevering back into the chair without being seen. Once settled, she silently pushed the chair back down the hall, and held it steady for him as he transferred back into her roommate’s too-soft bed.

“Goodnight, Cormoran,” she said softly, pausing in the doorway. His eyes were caught by the light glancing off her curve of her shoulder meeting her neck.

“Sleep well, Robin,” he replied. She nodded, once, then slipped out, letting the door swing closed behind her.

Cormoran once more focused on his breathing, pushing away all thoughts of Robin and her understanding and her rugby-printed shirt and her tucked-away smiles and her deft hands. He fell asleep while thinking about how he should not be thinking about the way her face had looked when she was recalling happy memories from her childhood.

* * *

Upon waking, Cormoran’s brain took a few moments to resume cognitive function. In this time, he recalled with perfect clarity the happenings of the early hours.

What on earth had he been thinking? None of that was the sort of thing he would usually allow himself to do with his young partner. But something about the night had made a space for it to happen.

He clenched his hand into a fist, feeling the ghost of Robin’s palm pressed against his own. Would she really knit him gloves?

There was a smell of bacon in the air, and he could hear music, faintly. This was enough incentive for him to throw off the feeling of dread at what the ramifications of the previous night would be, and to reach for his prosthesis. He would do quite a bit, if a good breakfast was waiting on the other side.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to lindmea, for help with the knitting; Robin's hat is [this one,](https://www.allfreeknitting.com/Knit-Hats/Blue-Braided-Knit-Beanie) but in dark maroon of course. I don't know how long this story will be, in the end, but you all seem to be enjoying it, and so I'll follow it to its conclusion. <3


	5. before the taking of a toast and tea.

Though the prosthesis was chafing, Cormoran bore the discomfort to follow his nose out into the kitchen. Robin, hair messily piled up, was humming along with the radio as she stood at the stove. 

Though her back was to him, Cormoran knew she couldn’t have missed his heavy tread coming down the hall. 

“Morning,” he rumbled, his voice gravelly in his throat.

“Good morning to you too,” she said, glancing at him over her shoulder. He could see the shadows beneath her eyes were dark as ever, but there was a lightness to her smile nonetheless. “I’ve got a kettle on, you can have tea in a moment if you’d like. You’ll have to wait if you want coffee, though.”

Cormoran’s gaze was caught on the back of her neck, a pale expanse of skin he rarely glimpsed. There was something vulnerable about seeing it now, and he felt acutely the way he’d been allowed into her private life as his eyes traced the smooth curve of her spine. “Tea’s fine, thanks,” he replied.

She nodded, swaying to the beat of the music coming from the tiny, 1950s-inspired radio sitting on a shelf. The music was generic pop, he couldn’t have identified it if he’d tried, but Robin evidently knew the song, mumbling lyrics under her breath.

Pulling up the same stool he’d sat on the night before, Cormoran spotted the time and nearly choked. “Is it really after ten?” he asked, appalled.

“Yes, but you can stop having a conniption, I emailed the Professor last night to reschedule this morning’s meeting. I told him you’d been unavoidably detained out of town. We don’t have to be in the office until after noon.”

Cormoran heaved a sigh of relief, his heart still going far too fast. “Jesus, when’d you have time for that?”

“After we went back to bed last night,” Robin said, carefully flipping thick slices of bacon. “It was gone three by then, there was no way in hell you’d be up in time for a meeting at nine.”

“Ah.” Cormoran didn’t know how to express his surprised gratitude that she had foreseen this and dealt with it unprompted. He settled for, “Smart thinking.”

She threw a smile back at him, pleased as she rummaged into the fridge to pull out an egg carton. Cormoran inhaled deeply, the scent of the crackling bacon making his mouth water. Just then, the switch on the electric kettle flipped, announcing the water was ready.

“More of the Bettys Blend?” Robin asked, turning away from the pan to reach, once more, for two mugs. Cormoran smiled as she gave him another of the large mugs he’d been using. She must have a set of them.

“That’s the one from last night, yeah?” he asked, watched her economical movements as she dropped bags, once more, into mugs. They drank a lot of tea, he and Robin.

“The one from the tea room back in Masham, yeah,” she said, smiling down at the hot water she was pouring. “My mum’s taken to sending me care packages, as though I’m still in uni, and she always adds some. I’ve got loads.”

“It’s good,” Cormoran said. “I was wondering how you were keeping that tin stocked.”

Robin had turned away to scoop the bacon out of the pan. “I’ll pass on your appreciation to my mum, then,” she said.

Cormoran took over the brewing as she began cracking eggs into a bowl. She’d done three when she turned back to him. “How many d’you want?” she asked.

“Three’s fine,” he said, not wanting to seem gluttonous. 

Robin gave him a sharply evaluative look, which morphed into a smile. “I’ll do you four, then,” she said, turning back to the skillet. She cracked eggs with confidence, directly on the counter instead of on the lip of the bowl, and he watched her, fascinated. He’d never seen anyone do them that way.

Of course she’d seen through him. After all, she’d ordered them both takeaway often enough to know how much he normally ate.

The song on the radio changed to something more plaintive, though still upbeat, and Robin’s sway stopped. He could hear, though, her humming along. He listened to the words, ignoring the odd thumping and whooshing that seemed to permeate music these days.

“I’m bulletproof, nothing to lose,” Robin sang absently as she threw shredded cheese in with the eggs. “Fire away, fire away…” She whisked, still singing, and Cormoran thought that this was the Robin from last night, still, somehow open and vulnerable and still so capable. Her arm, wrapped around the bowl, bore the silvery scar from last year, and he turned away, feeling oddly like an intruder.

“Shoot me down, but I won’t fall, I am titanium,” Robin sang, pouring the eggs into the skillet, where they sizzled in the bacon grease. He fished the tea bags out of the mugs, setting them on an abandoned plate. 

Watching Robin cook, he noticed once more the Rugby for Relief shirt she was wearing, its silhouette of a player reminding him of Matthew. _She wouldn’t be wearing one of His shirts_ , he reminded himself. It didn’t seem possible, not after all this time. He pushed this thought once more from his mind.

“D’you want toast as well?” Robin asked, interrupting her own singing. “We’ve only got whole wheat bread, Stacia’s got a thing about health foods.”

“That’s fine,” he said. “Yeah, if you’re having some.”

She managed to pop bread into the toaster without abandoning the eggs, which were beginning to look delicious. 

“Why don’t you sit at the table?” she asked, gesturing with her head. “Chairs’re probably easier than stools, and I’d like to sit as well.”

A thread of guilt, for letting her stand during their… interlude, during the night. “Of course,” he said, beginning to move towards the small, sturdy-looking dining table.

He sat, sipping his tea, as Robin began bringing things out to the table—plates, flatware, glasses. In an effort to feel useful, he cleared space in the clutter, gathering the craft supplies into a slightly precarious pile. 

Robin bore the food out to the table at last, the bacon and eggs smelling heavenly and the toast already dripping with butter. 

“I didn’t even ask if you’d like something other than scrambled,” she said as she sat down, suddenly appalled. “I just assumed…”

“Robin, it’s fine,” he said, scooping a generous portion of the fluffy eggs onto his plate, followed by at least five pieces of bacon. “You’re feeding me, I’m hardly going to complain. It looks delicious.”

“Oh,” Robin said, looking pleased. “Good. Thank you.”

She served herself, watching him surreptitiously as he took a bite. Cormoran nearly had to stifle a groan at the first mouthful; the eggs were perfectly fluffy, already salted and peppered, and he could taste the bacon grease on them.

“Tha’s good,” he said, as he swallowed. “That’s _damned_ good. Where’d you learn to make a breakfast like this?”

“My da,” she said, hiding her smile with a bite of her own. “He takes his bacon extremely seriously.”

“Mmrph,” Cormoran said around the bacon and eggs he was thoroughly enjoying. 

Robin laughed at him, her nose scrunching up and her dimples appearing. Cormoran, who had felt very undignified, all at once knew that he would do nearly anything to provoke that laugh from her, that un-self-conscious happiness that she so rarely let show.

They ate in companionable silence after that for a bit, Cormoran starting on a second helping, Robin nibbling her toast. The radio’s pop music, reliable for the past hour, cut out in favour of interminable adverts. After the fifth- perhaps sixth?- Robin got up, huffing, and turned it off.

In the silence that followed, Cormoran could hear himself chew, and the mood shifted. He could feel the tightness of the borrowed shirt acutely, could see how Robin crossed and re-crossed her legs. 

“About Mr. Andrews,” Robin said abruptly. “I was thinking I’d spend today digging into his connections, see if I can figure out his network. The leak’s playing a delicate game, but that means there must be a lot of moving parts. He can’t hide them all forever.”

Cormoran blinked. He’d nearly forgotten how this whole thing started- last night, the party, the discomforting, balding Mr. Andrews. Robin with smudged lipstick from kissing him….

“Does he have a first name?” Cormoran asked, trying to bring his brain back from that unexpected tangent. 

Robin gave him an odd look, but closed her eyes, her lips moving. “I think it’s Todd,” she said, looking at him once more. “But I’d have to check his business card again to be sure.”

“Todd?” Cormoran asked in disbelief.

“I know,” she said, “imagine calling that awful man ‘Todd,’ what on earth were his parents thinking?”

And now they were back in their usual give-and-take, the comfortable safe ground of work. Cormoran willfully pushed his sense-memory of how Robin’s dress had felt beneath his hand off to join the thoughts about Matthew’s shirt, in a box he labeled _things I am not thinking about today or possibly ever again._

“I’ll clean up the dishes,” Cormoran offered. 

“Oh, you don’t have to do that,” Robin said, startled. 

“You cooked, I’ll clean,” he said firmly. “Anyway, it’ll save us time , I can clean while you get dressed and we’ll be back in the office by noon.”

“Good point,” Robin said, mollified. She took a last bite of bacon, chewing thoughtfully. “And that’ll give you time to wash up and change, as well. We’ve got Mrs. Scarf coming at half-past one.”

“Oh, ugh,” Cormoran said, and Robin laughed at his wince. Mrs. Scarf wasn’t a bad customer, but she kept hiring them to trail her husband, and every time they came back with proof he’d been sleeping with someone else- his secretary, his personal trainer, their daughter’s Spanish teacher- Mrs. Scarf cried and cried and did nothing about it. (She’d earned her name for the giant, billowing scarves she wore, no matter the weather. They joked that someday she’d finally snap and strangle her husband with one; Cormoran was vaguely hoping she’d actually do it to the git.)

“Anyway,” Robin said.

“Yeah,” he replied.

There was something so comfortable about it, sitting at the breakfast table, talking shop. Charlotte had loved to have long, decadent breakfasts, but forbade him to talk about his work; he’d rarely eaten breakfast with the few girlfriends he’d had since. This felt… domestic.

Suddenly panicking, Cormoran pushed back from the table. “I’ll get started on those dishes, then,” he said, needing to move, to not be meeting Robin’s eyes, to do something with his hands.

“Ah, sure,” Robin said, startled but not surprised. “Fit as much as you can into the dishwasher, I’ll run it before we leave.”

“Yeah, sure. Swanky place, with a dishwasher and all.” This last he said flippantly, but Robin seemed to take him at face value.

“Well, Stacia comes from money,” she said, rising. “Honestly, I think she wanted a roommate more for the company than for help with the rent. There’s no way what I pay covers half of this place, but I’m hardly complaining.”

Cormoran made a vague noise to indicate he was listening. 

“Anyway, I don’t feel bad about paying less, seeing as how she’s turned the other bedroom into a studio, and how often she’s got Ashraf ‘round. I think it comes out even, in the end.”

She disappeared into her bedroom, and Cormoran set to work on the dishes with a will.

Scrubbing pans was meditative, and gave him space to think in the clear light of day. What was he doing, allowing himself to be caught up in the ease of domesticity with Robin? This was so far outside the careful boundaries he’d maintained since the Wedding, how could he have…

But he remembered that vulnerability in the cab, the way she’d stood folded in his doorway in the early hours, and knew he couldn’t have left her alone, not when she’d asked him to stay. He scrubbed viciously at the grease on the pan, not caring that he was splattering his borrowed shirt with soapy water. He had to get his head on straight. He had to forget how it felt to have her trace her fingers along the scar on his palm. The quiet, shadowy silence they’d shared in this kitchen at 3 in the morning. He had to push all of that away. They worked together, no more. 

_No more,_ he thought as he scrubbed, over and over until it became a rhythm. _No more, no more, no more._

He was rinsing when Robin came back out, now dressed as she normally was, sans makeup. Her hair was back down, as she usually wore it. All the traces of last night’s Robin had been wiped away.

“I’ll finish up here, you can go change,” she said, holding her hands out for the mug he’d been rinsing. He handed it over and left quietly, taking his suit from the back of the chair where he’d left it the night before and retreating to Stacia’s room once more.

Putting his good suit back on was far more of a hassle than he really wanted to deal with, but he hardly had any other options. Back on went the shirt, no longer starched, the grey slacks, the jacket. Wearing his clothing from the party made him feel as though he were doing a…. what was the term… a walk of shame, despite the absolute lack of anything resembling romance or sex his night had contained. He shook his head, folding the borrowed clothing and leaving it on top of the bed, which he’d made. 

“About ready to go?” Robin called as he came back to the kitchen. 

“Yeah,” he said. “Let’s get a jump on this case.”

Robin dimpled, gathering up her things as Cormoran put on his coat. He glanced around the flat- it really was a nice space, he thought. It was a shame, since he thought he’d be avoiding it in the future. He patted his pockets- keys, wallet, phone...

“Wait,” he said suddenly. “I left my mobile.”

She laughed. “Well, go get it, and I’ll meet you in the hall, yeah?”

He nodded, going back to Stacia’s room. There it was, still plugged in behind the headboard. He detached the cable, leaving it on the table as he headed back out to the hall.

“Thanks again,” Robin said as she locked the door behind him. “I really appreciate you, y’know, staying.”

“No problem,” he said, checking his phone for the first time since going to bed. “Hang on, my sister’s sent about a thousand messages.”

Getting on the elevator, Robin watched Cormoran’s eyebrows climb his forehead as he scrolled. 

“Is everything all right?”

“Yes. Well- no. Maybe. Apparently Jack had some sort of fit and has been in the hospital all night. The doctors said it’s most likely an isolated incident, but it might happen again.”

Cormoran felt an odd pang in his chest. He was not, as a rule, fond of children, but his nephew Jack had managed to become dearer to him than most of his blood relations. 

“That’s terrible! Do you need to go help at all?”

“I don’t think so,” he said, looking up as they stepped out into the sunshine. “I think she just needed someone to tell things to. She can be like that, sometimes.”

“You ought to go see him, still,” Robin said as they set off for the Tube. 

“Once we’ve got this case wrapped up, maybe,” Cormoran allowed. 

“Then I’ll put a rush on it,” she replied, with a hint of a smile. 

Following her down to the station, Cormoran felt as though things in his life were spinning oddly sideways. Thank goodness this case seemed to be fairly open-and-shut; on top of his irrepressible thoughts about Robin, and now Jack having some sort of minor seizure, he didn’t think he could juggle anything else.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song Robin's singing is, of course, [David Guetta feat. Sia - Titanium](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsrnGyRS6l4),. This fic, taking place just over a year past the events at the end of CoE, is set in 2012, and it was very popular then, and is, of course, entirely appropriate a song for Robin to love.


	6. in a minute there is time [interlude i]

One of the rare times Cormoran found his bulk- his “presence,” one might say- useful was on the Tube. He managed to get himself and Robin a seat by looming near a young man with a large bag who was wearing extremely questionable shoes until he nervously moved away.

Cormoran knew he should not be enjoying this time, this proximity to Robin. She was young, freshly divorced, dealing with nine years of baggage and some recently reawakened trauma. She was also his business partner. She was, in short, entirely unsuitable for any sort of… attraction.

And yet. He glanced over, seeing that Robin was checking the office email inbox on her mobile. She was smart, motivated, entirely committed to their work. She never took out her anger on other people. She fought for those who needed help. She was, in many ways, exactly the sort of woman he’d always considered to be a good partner.

And she was his partner. His business partner. He couldn’t allow one night’s interlude to allow his mind to run off on some odd fancy. They weren’t _close._ They worked together, that was all.

The memory of her tracing his hand on the counter-top resurfaced, and he clenched that hand into a fist at his side. The scar running across it rubbed against his finger-tips, and he recalled the fight with Brockbank that had put it there. The wound had bled for days, because he’d been incapable of not using his hand long enough to let it begin to heal properly. There had been too much to do.

He shook his head, wishing away these thoughts. Robin looked up at the movement, raising her eyebrows in silent inquiry. He shook his head again, and she nodded, turning back to her phone.

He liked that she understood him well enough to leave things alone. Charlotte had never once in her life left a stone unturned. She picked at things like scabs, every gesture, every sigh. She’d bring them up days later, wielding them like knives, _and what did you mean last week,_ she’d say, as though he remembered every word he’d ever said.

He shook his head again. He had to stop thinking about Charlotte. He had to stop comparing her against Robin. (Robin somehow always came out the better of the two. He was beginning, for possibly the first time in his life, to question the very underpinnings of the 16-year relationship; he’d always thought, deep down, that the relentless pull of her had been love. At its core, however fucked-up and unhealthy it had become, he’d thought it was love. And he was finding, slowly, that perhaps that relentless pull had been something else entirely.)

“Here’s us,” Robin said, standing, and Cormoran felt a wave of relief. He needed to get out of his own head. And he need to get out of this suit; it was ready to go to the cleaners, and he was ready for a shower. He rose, letting Robin lead them up towards the office.


End file.
